New paper out! Here's a puzzle: phototrophy, the ability to use light for energy, is one of life's great innovations. It evolved early and transformed the biosphere. But it evolved 2x. Why not just once, why not more? Our work suggests the answer is priority effects. www.nature.com/articles/s44...

Bivalves usurped brachiopods as the dominant benthic filter-feeders—the reasons why have been debated. new #Geology paper by Kemi Ashing-Giwa and colleagues support the hypothesis that sulfide played a significant role in the extinction’s selectivity. Read article: geosociety.co/Ashing-Giwa_et_al

Cladonia lichen. #Newfoundland, Canada. #fungifriends #fungi #hiking #lichen

Grateful to Philip Ball for this thoughtful piece on our recent hard-steps paper! @jmacalad.bsky.social @adamfrank4.bsky.social @astrowright.bsky.social

So happy to announce our new preprint, “A geothermal amoeba sets a new upper temperature limit for eukaryotes.” We cultured a novel amoeba from Lassen Volcanic NP (CA, USA) that divides at 63°C (145°F) 🔥 - a new record for euk growth! #protistsonsky 🧵

14 years since we lost Lynn Margulis (November 22, 2011). Still can’t believe she’s gone. A giant of biology, through her co-creation of the Gaia Hypothesis, & her endosymbiotic theory, she changed the way we see life, evolution, our planet, ourselves. I feel so privileged to have known her. 🧪

Please apply if you are interested in marine biogeochemistry and microbial dark oxygen production. Deadline: November 17th.

New in Trends in Ecology & Evolution: 'Earth system engineers' and the cumulative impact of organisms in deep time 🔓 #ecoevo #openaccess www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... A thread 🧵:

Human-driven extinction event not yet the "sixth mass extinction", but is very likely the largest extinction event of the last 66 million yrs. 🌏 🧪 Read about it in our new paper led by @jackhhatfield.bsky.social and Katie Davis @anthropocenebio.bsky.social doi.org/10.1111/gcb....

Andrea Halling, a grad student at University of Colorado Boulder, recently led experiments with living algae to test how the physical conditions of ancient seawater might have impacted ancient single-celled organisms. quantamagazine.org/the-physics-...

Very happy to share this new paper we've recently published. Do biospheres use information in the same way organisms do? Can we think of biospheres as agents? "Exo-Daisy World: Revisiting Gaia Theory through an Informational Architecture Perspective" iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3...

In one week my book about carbon comes out, and here's some nice things some nice people have said about it. If you feel moved to do so, the link below provides a means of purchase. Thank you, that is all. www.harpercollins.com/products/the...

🚨 Paper alert! 🚨 After >1 year in review and six (6!) reviewers, I'm thrilled that this paper is finally out! Here, we provide the first data-based record of marine dissolved organic carbon in the geologic past. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The proceedings volume from our Nov24 meeting on the evolution of biospheres is just in PhilTransB @royalsocietypublishing.org delivering insights into how our biosphere evolved - and how other biospheres may evolve

So pleased to be part of this special issue following a wonderful meeting at @royalsociety.org on Chance and Purpose in the Biosphere last year. Do check it out

A red algal polysaccharide influences the multicellular development of the choanoflagellate Salpingoeca rosetta in @currentbiology.bsky.social www.cell.com/current-biol...

At @goldschmidt-confer.bsky.social last week, scientists reported the first biomarkers from a Snowball Earth event(!!!!) It’s a first glimpse of life under the ice at a time when glaciers blanketed the world from pole to equator. New from me for @science.org 🧪 www.science.org/content/arti...

Please apply if you are interested in environmental microbiology topics such as microbial dark oxygen production and methane cycling under oxygen depletion.

‼️I'm looking for a postdoc‼️ Come join effort in using metagenomes to quantify microbial catabolic potential and carbon substrate availability at the ecosystem level. We seek to understand evolutionary forces shaping the carbon cycle. Part of ccomp-stc.org careers.peopleclick.com/careerscp/cl...

Two Postdoc Opportunities in Environmental Microbiology! Join us and work on microbial key players exposed to oxygen depletion. Please share widely! Deadline: 25 July More information can be found here: tinyurl.com/4kwzzt6p

Wrote a long book that comes out August. It covers from the origins of life at alkaline hydrothermal vents some 4 billion years ago through the Volcker Shock. I'm told pre-orders help, so if that sounds like your thing, buy one, won't you? www.harpercollins.com/products/the...

So proud of my lab mates! "We demonstrate that H2 from iron-sulfide precipitation under simulated early Earth hydrothermal geochemistry fuels a H2-dependent primordial metabolism." www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Next #SETILive: Is Intelligent Life Easy? TODAY, Thursday, Apr 24, 11:00 AM PDT Join @allplanets.bsky.social in an in-depth discussion with Dr. Dan Mills about why intelligent life may be common and how this could affect our search for life beyond Earth. 🧪 WATCH LIVE: youtube.com/live/hEQJfyW...

🚨Palaeoverse Lecture Series🚨 🗓️24th April 2025, 16:00 UTC🗓️ Next week’s talk is from Dr Richard Stockey @richardstockey.bsky.social from University of Southampton, on “Modelling ancient animal habitats in space and time: linking fossils and Earth system models” Register here: bit.ly/palaeoverse-...

The last bit of Frankie Dunn's PhD is finally published! @bristolpalaeo.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Does a universal law govern how thing evolve over time to create ever more complexity? And does this mean the future is unpredictable, even in principle, from the present? I explore these ideas in my latest piece for Quanta. www.quantamagazine.org/why-everythi...

Excited for Life and Planet 2025 in London this July - please don't forget to submit your (free) abstracts! lifeandplanet.com

Really pleased to be part of this project which shows that aerobic bacteria arose in the Archaean, long before the GOE - after which aerobes proliferated through HGT. Fun @bristolpalaeo.bsky.social collab including @tweethinking.bsky.social @sabifo4.bsky.social @emoody.bsky.social Davide Pisani

Super cool new paper by @sshekhr.bsky.social and @wallaceucsf.bsky.social showing that there are collective benefits to simple multicellularity in the *very* charismatic Stentor. www.nature.com/articles/s41... Great write up in the NYT by @jack-tamisiea.bsky.social! www.nytimes.com/2025/03/31/s...

Common cause vs sampling intensity variation in the earliest eukaryote diversity dynamics in the Proterozoic Eon: "...we favor the explanation that the pattern of early eukaryote diversity is driven by variations in paleontological sampling." doi.org/10.1017/pab.... 🧪 #Paleobio ⚒️ #Geology #EvoBio

"The total amount of intracellular phosphate stored in the benthic foraminifer Ammonia confertitesta in the Wadden Sea during a bloom is as high as around 5% of the annual consumption of phosphorus (P) fertilizer in Germany."

Very excited to see this! "Thus, we can deduce that [the first eukaryote common ancestor] was an anaerobic, syntrophic, peptide-degrading, mesophilic archaeon that had simple cell structure with branching protrusions and no endomembrane system."

#OverheardAtCarnegie: “Those who look through microscopes too rarely talk to people who look through telescopes.”

Adding planktonic algae to anoxic marine sediments promotes the anaerobic growth of phagotrophic #eukaryotes. The #Neoproterozoic Rise of Algae may have similarly promoted benthic phagotrophs, directing carbon, energy, and nutrients to early animals. #ProtistsOnSky www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Our latest: a Richard Boyle (Exeter) production, using simulations to show how differential selection of biogeochemical cycles can lead to planetary homeostasis, with some empirical data from @emoody.bsky.social and @sabifo4.bsky.social @bristolpalaeo.bsky.social

Had fun writing this with @jmacalad.bsky.social and @astrowright.bsky.social!

The "hard-steps" model argues that human-like life was unlikely to evolve on Earth and is vanishingly rare in the Universe. Here, in our new Science Advances article, we challenge its foundational logic: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...